FreedomPop, a company that sells wireless hotspot devices with free mobile data, is planning to offer a full-blown cellular service with free voice calls and text messages this summer.

According to AllThingsD, FreedomPop has been amassing a pile of refurbished phones that once ran on Sprint’s 4G WiMax network, such as the Samsung Galaxy SII and HTC Evo 4G, and plans to sell them for under $200 with no contract. In exchange, FreedomPop subscribers will get 500 MB of data and 200 voice minutes (via VoIP) per month, plus unlimited text messages.

FreedomPop hopes to make money by selling add-on services, such as unlimited calling, additional data and faster connection speeds. As AllThingsD’s Ina Fried points out, it’s a strategy reminiscent of dotcom-era companies like NetZero, which gave away basic dial-up Internet service for free. (Incidentally, NetZero rose from the dead recently with free wireless Internet service, but it only lasts for a year before customers must pay for subscriptions.)

Is FreedomPop worth considering? Sure, but only if you’re keenly aware of its hidden costs and gotchas. And from what I’ve seen of FreedomPop’s existing free data service, the company seems to try its best to keep potential users in the dark.

Here are a couple things to know about FreedomPop’s free data service, which is already available today:

If you use less than 5 MB of data in a given month, you get charged a $0.99 “Active Status fee.”

By default, when you reach your final 100 MB of data in a given month, FreedomPop automatically charges $10 to fill your plan back up. To avoid the automatic charge, you must change your billing settings on FreedomPop’s website.

Finding the above stipulations on FreedomPop’s website isn’t easy. There’s no mention of them on the home page, nor on the terms of service page that’s linked from the home page. You’ll only find them on a separate “Service Plan, Equipment, and Payment Terms” page, which is linked from the main terms of service. Even then, the part about extra fees is buried beneath six other sections of legalese.

FreedomPop does give subscribers a chance to opt out of automatic refills on the final service activation page, but the wording (“To ensure uninterrupted service, top up my freedompop account”) is vague. It doesn’t say that the charge is recurring, nor does it mention the 100-MB trigger.

Jared Newman / TIME.com

FreedomPop also peppers users with additional offers during the sign-up process, while engaging in some classic sneakiness: On one page, an offer for 2 GB per month is advertised as “100% FREE” and selected by default, while the fine print mentions that a charge of $17.99 kicks in after one month. Another page offers faster speeds for $3.99 per month with a big green “Get Offer!” button, while the option to pass is presented in tiny text.

Other aspects of FreedomPop’s service are hidden from prospective customers as well. You can’t find out the cost of the devices without going through the sign-up process, during which you must enter an e-mail address and mailing address. And while FreedomPop’s home page advertises 4G speeds, users must pay $3.99 per month extra to guarantee the full speed that the network allows.

The fees themselves don’t bother me too much. They’re no worse than the below-the-line fees and value-added services of major wireless carriers, and if you’re mindful of FreedomPop’s policies, it’s certainly possible to get free data. I’ve used the service in Cincinnati, and it works.

I just wish that FreedomPop wasn’t so sketchy in the way it presents its services. It’d be easier to get excited about the upcoming free wireless service if the company was more transparent. Instead, I’m wondering what other new ways FreedomPop will invent to extract money from unsuspecting users.

UPDATE: FreedomPop CEO Stephen Stokols wrote in to address a couple of the points above. First, he pointed out that users receive an e-mail alerting them to the $10 automatic top-up after they sign up. FreedomPop began sending those e-mails to new users about 2.5 months ago. Second, starting last month, FreedomPop began waiving the $0.99 “Active Status fee” for new subscribers, and will eventually be doing so for existing users. It seems FreedomPop is working to address criticisms, but the company still has more work to do on being up front about the cost of the hardware and other fees before people sign up, not after they’ve handed over personal details and/or payment info. That issue, combined with the additional services that FreedomPop tries to sneak past new users, is what ultimately leaves a sour taste, not the fees themselves.

Complaints galore about customer service, but how does the Freedompop software/app actually work?

Say I'm not very diligent about adjusting certain settings -- 'User Error' is my middle name -- One day I come home and fire up my smartphone/tablet -- I connect to my own home Wifi network -- I watch numerous Youtube vids gobbling up tons of mbs in data -- it's goes way over 500mbs -- The next day I make a Google Voice call to my mother, also using my Home Wifi Connection, Mom and me talk for well over 2 hours.

Question: Will I suddenly find that I've been charged $10 and/or cut off for going over the Freedompop free data cap, and will I now have only 80 minutes remaining on my free Talk plan while I was using my already paid-for Home Wifi?

Does Freedompop take 'master control' over Wifi? Does it continue to deduct minutes/data, no matter what Wifi signal I'm connected to?

Is there any ability to turn off Freedompop, to stop it from consuming the free data/minutes? Can my device switch between Freedompop service and Home Wifi?

For example with traditional cellular contracts, I can turn it off and go Wifi Only while at home, saving cellular data and avoiding any overage. Is this also true with Freedompop or not?

If I use up ALL of my free data/talk/text allowed per month, will Freedompop block my device from connecting to any Wifi, even in my own home? Can Freedompop render my Wifi enabled device useless for a period of time?

This company as the ability to be great if they change the way they do business. Number one, they must stop sending phones out to customers via Smart Ship. Smart Ship allows the USPS to drop a package at your door without you signing for it. That means if you live in a apartment building, anyone can take your package right from in front of your door. I am dealing with a situation right now like this and each time I call back about a refund they keep telling me they need to escalate the shipment with the shipping department. All products that cannot fit inside a mail box should be sent either FedEx or UPS signature required. The customer does not seem to have any rights when it comes to resolving problems with this company. Maybe their under staffed. Until they resolve my issue with them, I will continue to pursue it even if it means filing a law suit because as of now I am out of $99.99 and no phone to show for it. If they solve my issue soon, I'll be more than happy to give them a better review because one thing they do have in their favor is the cost of cell phone plans and the cost of wifi plans.

I got this service almost a month ago. First they sent me a charger that doesn't work, so I had to buy a new one, then I put in a customer service ticket because the phone won't hold a charge. After 2 weeks I got an email asking me if my issue was resolved. 2-3 days ago I told them no it was not and that a rep on the phone told me I was getting a new battery, but that hasn't happened. No response to me email as of yet. I am frustrated to say the least. The voice part of my service is sketchy at best, even though my husband uses the sprint network on Virgin mobile in the same area as I do and his service is fine. I constantly miss text messages as well. The texts show up on my lock screen and when I open the app, there is no text to be found.

I just cancelled my Freedompop internet. The service was pretty bad and then I got my first credit card charge, about 3 times what I expected. When they finally responded to the email I sent asking about the charge and cancelling, they sent a series of emails saying that they were cancelling my premium service, switching to free service, cancelling service, refunding my money, and one email asking how I would rate the customer service I got from "Latonda". It later dawned on my how sneaky these guys are, they know that a lot of their customer would be reluctant to complain if they think that they're complaining about the service they got from a black women. These guys raise sleeziness to a whole new level.

I agree with this article. However, it fails to mention how pour Freedompop is with Technical support and customer service. I agree with Tntazmania (Richie). My services as of late never works. If I do finally get connectivity, it only last 20 to 30 minutes. Freedompop is very poor with technical support and they use loop holes to trick you out of money. I have been a customer with Freedompop almost a year. When I used Freedompop just to access email... the services worked fine. However, as soon as I relocated and had to depend on Freedompop more frequently for internet service, the internet provider became very undependable. Services were inactivated every other week. Tech support became more out of reach the longer you have the service. It soon got to the point whereas the only way I could reach someone was to submit an email. Freedompop customer service is so poor that the longest wait time I had before someone actually got back to me was 2 months. When I was finally reached someone, not only was my situation not resolved but the credit I had on the account that I tried to get refunded back to me disappeared and I received an email stating credit on the account expires after 90 days. When I explain to Freedompop that this does not apply to me because they took 2 months to respond back to me, I get no response in return.

Its time to throw in the towel and find a new provider. I guess you get what you pay for. lol

I learned it the hard way! They shipped me the device after a month long waiting period. Then one night when I put Elmo vids for my son, I got a message telling me my account was suspended. The next morning I notice while checking my account they charged me five time 10 dollars and overdrafted my checking. Then each overdraft was a 39 dollars fee from my pnc account.

When I called to cancel they tried to convince me to change data plan even though my last transaction was a 29 dollars upgrade!

I would not advise anybody to pick that service unless you are able to check your gigs every hour to make sure you don't go above your limit because if you reach that limit they will keep charging your account to keep your service automatically!

My experience so far with tech support is laughable! The system that is set up for troubleshooting or getting an issue resolved is NON-existent! I understand its beta but the money we pay is not monopoly money, its REAL cash. So I would expect by this time that support should be real. I paid for the yearly unlimited plan 29 days ago and still don't have a working phone. I can call out but can't receive calls. Its not a handset issue or a signal issue or a PRL issue. Callers get a message that my phone has been disconnected and is no longer in service. I have opened multiple tickets thru support, sales, the forums, Admins, and even Freedom Pop's Facebook. Tech support has no tier support system or anything for escalation. You just get reassigned to different techs and it starts all over again with same canned responses"reset your phone, re-download software, do a PRL update lol What a group! The latest response from tech support is the following, and he has no clue. But at least he didn't say do a PRL update or as some have suggested "USE GOOGLE VOICE for calling instead of using the freedompop app"

"

"Dear Richie, Good Afternoon, Thank you for contacting FreedomPop's email support team.

After reviewing your account I see it is cancelled to activate the account you have to add a new data plan.

If you have any additional questions, comments or concerns, I am happy to further assist you. Have a great day!

Thank you for your support!

Your Personal FreedomPop Support Agent,DanielD""

And so the saga continues..This new tech evidently doesn't even have the ability to see or read all the past notes on my ticket over the month or is just clueless.

If something sounds too good to be true...it usually is. How does a business make a profit on not charging for service...common sense tells you there has to be hidden fees. They are counting on the few who follow every detail to keep there service free, but they know the masses will gladly pay the hidden fees, especially if it comes out being cheaper than being gouged the other big cell phone companies in the long run.

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FreedomPop also has a few more little hidden things too Like as of October of 2014 maybe even September of 2014 FreedomPop if you have a credit card attached to your account which you do not need one if you have the free app service which give you 200 minutes and 500 texts to use with your existing cell phone service. but if you used the BYOD or bought a device from them on your monthly billing cycle date they actually suspended your account whether or not your have the funds in the credit card to pay for the services if you upgraded from the free plan or added services. though the suspension is temporary and in most cases will be automatically restored with in 24 hours you can also restore the service yourself by readding your credit card to your account. BE AWARE that if you have bought a device from them or a device branded to them this will affect you whether or not you are paying for upgraded services or even if your are using their free plan. This temporary suspension every month is due to what they call a billing error. Also if you happen to order a device from them you are supposed to get a free month of service for signing up with them. but when i were to get my second device from them which was a Galaxy S3 which was actually ordered in late august it happended to be on backorder they never notified me that it was on back order and it wasn't until 3 weeks later when i still haven't received the device i was finally able to talk to some one at freedompop. i actually didnt get the device for 33 days after i ordered it. but here is the biggest catch of all. FreedomPop actually starts billing you for thier service the day after you sign up for your service or order your phone whether or not you have possession of the device your first billing cycle is 45 days and it starts the day after you get the phone during this first 45 days your service should be free and in most cases it is in my case my device was on back order for a month and my free month was only 11 days.i called them up and they would assure me that my account would not get suspended because i wasnt going to pay for a month of service and that they would extend my free month for another 30 days. the 12 day of service my account did infact get suspended simply because i would call my bank to block the charge from freedompop and they did and the and i would actually cancel both my devices at the time. but keeping the phone and it being able to be used on any mvno using the sprint network i was calling in to see if i can activate that phone on another carrier but then i would run into yet another problem and that was that my devices were mnvo locked which means only a rep from freedompop can release the devices ESN back into the sprint network pool to be able to activate it on another carrier. so i would call back and i would actually get ahold of the same supervisor who had promised me that my account wouldnt get suspeneded and he though he sounds like a girl would actually reactivate both my devices with out a credit card which the previous agents refused to so and as a little way of saying sorry would give me the free month i was promise as well as an additional free month for my first device. but one of the reasons i would cancel both devices is that earlier month when my first device would reach its billing cycle renewal date i was affected by this billing error for the first time. though not at all my fault my account was suspended and i would have the addional addon of the rollover of my unused data which at the time was an additional 3.49 a month. but the policies of freedompop are that if your account is suspended for any reason you forfiet your unused rollover data, but this was not at all my fault and until now they have not returned my unused data but they did refund my monthly fee of 23.49 when i would cancel my service which included my 2gb data and the rollover do if you plan on getting the roll over do not get it because you will be paying for something you arent getting i've made the complaint to the supervisors but nothing was ever done to fix it and until now the billing error still happens because as of only 6 days ago both my devices were once again suspended now for the 6th time. even if you have the free services which i actually downgraded to see if the billing error will affect that to it affects free services only if you have a credit card linked to your account.

One last tidbit of freedompop catches and this is regarding only internet devices that use 4G WIMAX and the majority of the freedompop hotspots with the exception of the mifi 500 and the u770 are the only ones not affected by this situation as well as non of the phone are either since they all are LTE based not WIMAX. As of October of 2013 which is a month after freedompop launched thier services and they would know this was going to happened sprint would announce that all WIMAX devices will no longer be sold and will lose thier 4g access by October of 2015 once those new devices with a 2 year contract are up freedompop knew this was going to happen and even though they offered 4G WIMAX service at first no user will actually get 4G Services untill they started rolling out the 4GLTE devices and inorder to use thier services you had to pay to enable 3g even for the free amount of 500gb though it was only 3.99 still it would not be free. FreedomPop never admitted to placing a block on the sprint network for all 4g wimax devices but a block actually does exist with thier sprint mvno id which was confirmed by members of sprint's mvno development team. so if you have a wimax device or planning on getting one be aware you are going to have to pay atleast 3.99 for use of the 3g access. 4glte devices are not affected by this but also be aware that sprint's lte service has to be available where you are using it and since 4glte is fairly new to sprint and is currently still be deployed nationwide that option for 4glte is not available to everyone as of yet however sprint does plan on doing that so that option will be available to everyone in the near future also if you have a free phone the phone actually is internet only enabled with sprint. you cannot actually make and receive calls with out the freedompop app or texts for that matter and your sprint number which is assigned to all phone is actually different from the freedompop phone however if you have a phone and you are not able to get 4glte the 3g even with the free plan is actually free. but this only applies to freedompop phones with are all 4glte enabled. I have an S3 as well as an overdrive and i discovered all this the hard way so take into consideration when you decide to sign up with then but if you want cheap or even free this is definately the way to go but be aware of their little quirks. and buying the devices isnt a bad deal they are cheaper than if you were to get them from sprint as well as the cost of the plans are more than reasonable if you upgrade. you can also get them cheaper than on thier website on ebay buy buying them from ebay seller freedompop4g which is actually is freedompop and the prices there are actually about 15% lower than on freedompops website. but you'd pay for shipping which freedompop's website usually gives for free but its only 9.99 if you'd didnt get one of freedompops free shipping promos they only charge 6.99 so an extra 3 bucks for about 15% off aint bad either.

i hope all this helps everyone regarding little stuff the editor left out or just didnt know about but this should help you be more informed about thier little catches which is the intent of this article to begin with also the original 45 days is supposed to include 2 weeks to allow for shipping of the device and for standard shipping is usually about 5-7 days and is sent out by fedex smart post which is fedex and usps mixed together so they do deliver on the weekends. expedited services are usually fedex too unless it actually ships from freedompops official corporate warehouse in ca where they use ups there the majority of the orders are send to a warehouse in indiana which actually provides phones for multiple services and most refurbs and warranty replacements for those services will actually ship from that same facility those other services are not just sprint but verizon and att and a ton more. and if you were to get a free goverment phone from say safelink wireless by tracfone or assurance wireless by virgin mobile your phone will ship from that same warehouse as well. the warehouse is actually owned and operated by a third party independant company called wireless warehouse. and that warehouse has thousands of phones at any given time and they usually are never out of stock i just happened to order mine when the lte phones just started rolling out and the s3 is one of the more popular phones to begin with. as i actually have 3 of them myself on verizon, freedompop and on us cellular and i love then damn phone.

All the freedompop phones actually come with custom freedompop firmware roms but once again if your tech savvy replacing them with the original sprint versions or even a custom rom such as liquidrom isnt too hard and actually very easy on samsung devices because they were purposedly designed with the ability to replace or customize firmwares using something called odin by the end user every samsung device i've had as well as most motorolas have a feature or a similar feature. i have currently run liquidrom on my phone and its way better since alot more features work and using that thirdparty rom also allows you to use the hotspot and usb tether with out needing to pay for that additional service as well so there are tons of little ways to beat the system. if you happen to have a freedompop phone i recommend you restore the original firmwares for the sprint network because they simply work better and more options are infact available to you and if you want to get even crazier check out third party firmwares which are tons better in this case. also be aware that using a third party firmware will actually void your 90 day warranty and also void your device protection plan because it require you to root your phone and once your phone is rooted your phone will note that in a special section of the phones bootloader which even if you were to restore the original firmware will still indicate it was once rooted. rooting your phone will void your warranty and or protection plan for your device so if you dont have either your good and it shouldnt matter. also rooting your phone will void the warranty on all carriers not just freedompop since all android phones with gingerbread some people have even told me that it was also on froyo which is the version prior to gingerbread but i never had a phone running froyo and up have that feature on thier bootloader and some phones will even display in the phones about phone section of the settings app if the phone is rooted. so becareful when rooting because doing it wrong with certain phones can brick the phone and some fones the kyoceras and some lgs actually do not give you the option of getting into a usb adb download mode to restore the firmware back to factory versions. there are also ways around that too but its much more difficult.

another comment is freedompop does now give the option to turn off automatic top off and if that option is off 100 mbs before your data limit so if you have 500 mbs your service will be suspended at 400mbs you will not be charged but your service will be suspended till your next billing cycle or change your plan to a better one that option wasn't always available to me and my account has been suspended for gettin close to that 100 mb limit several times but really it isnt all that bad yeah it may be a scam because of all the hidden bs and the fact that that they only have 10 customer service agents to assist thousands of customers (that is an exaggeration btw i have no idea how many agents there are but i do know there are only 4 supervisors karl, and vaughn and a two more women). both karl and vaughn are guys which totally can be mistaken for women and actually getting ahold of customer service for any reason is a rather pain but if you need help here is a tip call thier sales line most of thier agents there can actually assist you and all the departments use the same 4 supervisors. the reason for this tip is simple most companies actually do not have queues for thier sales departments. and for good reason they want your business and they arent going to get your business if you are on hold for over and hour. but calling tech support directly you would normally not get through and after 60 minutes they say leave a voicemail and they will call u back and drop the call. and if you were to call back you'll be back at the end of the line once again. thier customer service is crap i give everyone that but as i said if you are willing to put up with the hidden crap it really isnt too bad for cheap or free services and i frankly like it its gotten me fairly good service infact better than some others regarding reliability. so hell i say give it a shot dispite what everyone else says and i'm relatively happy with it and the price aint all that bad either.

I've been a customer since Jan of 2014 and frankly other than thier poor customer service it really isnt bad almost all companies give poor customer service the company i hate the most regarding customer service happens to be comcast. And during every call to comcast every agent has to tell you about thier comcast customer guarantee which right now i think its total crap

i've had issues with a "free addon" for over 2 years pratically since they introduced the feature and until i disconnected that particular service that the "free addon" was associated with it has been fixed on and off over the two years and at one point would be out for an entire year and it gotten to the point were i'd be calling in every 2 months to fix the problem and it would mist of the time get fix when the agent decided to call me back which they were supposed to do with in 72 hours the majority of the time i never got a call back and i would only get a call back for that issue 3 times two of them way past the 72 hours they promised as 30 days and 45 days is definately past that the third time they would call back that particular service was already in pending disconnect because i was tired of it. all in all that feature was fixed a total of 4 times and out 5 and for most of the 2 years other problem was with my secondary emails that problem has existed now for 8 months and currently still exists and never once was fixed since i were to report it. it has gotten to the point where call in to having it fixed is completely futile so i dont bother anymore. but disconnecting my phone and tv was nightmare in itself i was on the phone with comcast every day for 10 days till the disconnections were complete one for almost 14 hours at day and i would speak to 47 different agents and nothing would have gotten done for 10 of those hours but that same day once the confirmation of the pending disconnect would occur a problem with the remaining service would arise they disabled my modem when it shouldnt have been touched at all and getting them to actually look at it was hard as hell since thier tech support system would not let them access the modem's config since it was in pending disconnect. this would happen close to midnight that night they claim the modem was disabled due to an outage but being a former cable tech for comcast myself i actually checked the signal and all signals were actually good and i even had one of those specialized testers which talk back to the modem and digital device servers an those tests would come up normal. so i knew at that point they disabled my modem and the only way for me to reactive my modem is by calling billing but at mid night they were already closed. but there is a department which i knew could override the pending disconnect and they were able to troubleshoot my modem. and it was the account securities department and i knew they can override that because the deal with the disabling of accounts and have access to do just that. but customer service altogether sucks. the only companies i have yet to have a problem with customer service is directv and vonage they have always statisfied me by the end of the call and i've had them only for a month so i do expect problems sometime in the future but i hope i dont. i no longer have vonage but they were always good to me and met my needs every time.

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I think you missed the point. I have a spanking Note 3 that is not connected to a carrier right now and I have been using using WIFI. I downloaded MagicJack app to it and forwarded my MagicJack landline number and calls to it. I could still use this cell phone! Come Freedompop. I downloaded the app to my cell, got myself a free cell number and not only I can make and receive calls on my cell but text, something impossible with MagicJack which is landline based. Add the mobile modem hardware from Freedompop for $5.00 a month and now I get WIFI almost anywhere and when I cannot I get a 4G or LTE connection on the fly. I think it is genial! No one is going to buy an obsolete cell phone from Freedompop. Whenever they keep their carrier or not they can have a second cell number instead of a phone with two SIM cards. When their carrier cut them off they can still use their cell with Freedompop. For now on anyway I will buy my phones outright in full and use Freedompop network at a fraction of the price. In the old days I got rid off AT&T landlines. Now I can get rid of AT&T cellular network. This is a brave new world!

@domperignon I too just recently switched to the $15.99/month unlimited data Freedom Pop plan w/ tethering and am using the MagicJack app for phone calls which I was able to carry over my phone number to. I am able to stream on up to 3 devices at a time with my tethering data as well as surf. I did however notice that Freedom Pop's call quality was not as good as MagicJack's and so therefore I ditched the Freedom Pop call/text plan for MagicJack which when broken down is less expensive than even Freedom Pop's VoIP App and is better quality. Well duhhh i'm sure the proof is in the pudding.

Mathematically, when broken down.

-> I use to pay $85/month for T-Mobile that adds up to $1020/year

-> With Freedom Pop I pay $15.99/month plus $50/year for MagicJack so when broken down

Hmmm. Maybe I just believed someone when they told me that they changed my account to the free one. I wanted to cancel but they told me it was easier to just switch to the free plan. Little did I know they upgraded my plan and started charging me more. When I called, they didn't have a record of my call, so they wouldn't refund me (odd, no call to upgrade either) but they were sorry. Then Talia just canceled my account....which hasn't used any data for 4 months.

Hmmmm. Either ignorance is bliss or everyone else commenting is clueless. Maybe it's because I have great coverage in New York? Maybe it's because I save my business literally $350 a month? I really don't get it. I purchased 10 FreedomPop hotspots for my business (distributed to sales staff and bought one of their routers for my small office) and everything is fine. Plans were reasonable and keep half my hotspots on the free plan. Does this group understand that you can downgrade to the free plan when you login to their interface? I truly believe people rush to frustration and don't take the time to think. Just make sure your area has coverage and you should be fine. I'm all for these guys.

I have tried to contact freedom pop regarding a defective phone and they sent me on the 20th of January 2015. I have spoken with five different customer service agents who told me that I would be able to return the phone and that I would be contacted with in 24 hours. It has now been 10 days. each time I call somebody lies to me and tells me they will contact me about how to return the phone. I have never been contacted. The last time I called they told me the phone was with outside the warranty. This is ridiculous since I've only had the phone for 10 days and it only worked for one day. There is something wrong with the charging module. You cannot recharge the phone through the charging module. I really wanted this to work. But at this point I can tell that freedom pop is not a company that cares about their customers or fulfills their word. Right now I am waiting for a promised call back from freedom pop.

Needless to say their technical support never really support. They
promised a battery replacement that was never sent, they promised to get
back with me by emails - never did. They wanted to charge me to ship
back a device that was not even used for a minute. Worst service I have
ever seen. That company won't survive

for the long run, and I hope my review would help shorten its existence.I can go on and on with how bad their service and how shady this company is.

For
those of you who wrote - "you get what you paid for", this is not the
case. With this company you don't even get what you paid for. You get
much much less than that, and in fact you might loose more than

you even considered when you first signed in to their service. In other word - a scam.

Like many comments before me stated - THIS IS A SCAM. Stay away from this company. After one year of

service and 5 different devices I can tell you for sure they are a scam. Not only you will get devices that don't

work, representatives that never help, and promises to solve issue that would never be solved. The biggest scam

of all is their "500 mb of data free". After using one of their hotspot devices (the photon 4G) for about a year, they blocked

this device and i got a message to call them. Of course I would have to wait 40 minutes on the line to get a rep, so I called their "sales department" which answer within 20 seconds (when you want to purchase something they will respond immediately these crooks). When asking the rep why was i blocked, he didn't provide and explanation and wanted to transfer me to technical support. I refused and asked him if freedompop blocks account after a certain time. His only answer was, pay close attention: "It depends on the amount of usage". You got that? Freedompop will block your 500 mb for free

after several month or a year when you have reached a certain data usage, so it is not free for life.

Yes. It is right. Freedompop is a total scam. I have signed for this thinking that it would cost me $26 monthly payment. Ha ha... The first day I have got equipment I decided to watch movie. To the moment I finished watching it I have got 3 emails that my account was charged 3 times $10.00. I called to freedompop right away asking to cancel service. In one month my account was charged again $ 26.00. So watching movie cost me $56.00 plus cost of equipment...

this thing is a total scam, they hide multiple BS services when you sign up , they put the word free in big, left and right, and trick you. the next thing you know you pay $30-40 a month for things you don't even understand, and when you downgrade again to the "real free", they still manage to have some phone services and other network services charged to your credit card. I was not even able to use their internet because it was not working. I am sure they make millions in charging customers who don';t even understand what they are billed for and forget to cancel. That's their whole business model, that's why they pretend to be cheap. they make it up by overcharging and tricking "free accounts".

You know it's redicilous. All these refurbished phones. When they send me my first galaxy s3 it had cracks all over the rim. And I had a problem hearing other people, constantly needing them to repeat. So I sent them my phone back, didn't have a phone for a month. When I received my second phone it was even worse. You opened the backing and it looks like old mustard. Also, they take money out of your account without it being authorized. They will tell you you have unlimited everything but that's a big fat lie!!! Never in my life would I ever recommend Freedompop. They are money sucking, losing piecing of crap!! Last but not least when you call them it takes them and hour or longer to answer. Probably because so many people are calling and complaining! On their servey I with I could give them a negative 100!!! Do Not get with Freedompop you will regret it. You'll just be lied to.

i turned off automatic top-up feature. But they still charged me like $40 for data overuse. they don't automatically cut you off at 500mb instead they let u use it till 2gb. then they cut you off and charge you a high fee. the top-up feature is a joke. it doesn't even work. shame shame shame. this company may have a good slogan and FAKE believe by saying that internet should be free for everyone. But the company tried every way to charge u legally and illegally.

i'm not going to waste my life on calling them to get my money back. their emailing srv is as bad. just get an unlimited prepaid srv and skip the hassle!

Well, it is clear, now. The reason companies like this one exist is people like you, in this comment section. You bought into this scam thinking you're going to be getting something for almost nothing. The rest of us with established mobile providers are a bunch of morons for paying full price.

Next time your in Walmart's or Target and your total is $87.50 just give them a hundred dollar bill and walk off. It's almost the same thing, as your comment leads us to believe. You may not have to worry about money or being treated right cause your so animated and virtual.

Actually look at the site, it is very vague what you get. You really thing you are getting the Free plan, but obviously you are not getting it Free. I know there is no FREE LUNCH, so you should look at FreedomPop with a grain of salt. I looked at them, and decided NO!!

They advertised unlimited (but throttled) data above 1GB on a phone. I bought. A DISASTER. I kept getting cut off from data, they took my money and never delivered. Then their tech support said "send us the phone back we'll replaced it" and after I paid shipping and insurance and sent their phone back, they sent me a message that they had cancelled my account. No refund. I get NO REPLIES TO ANY CALLS OR MESSAGES. Shysters. Are they going out of business?

Now use Tracfone but the phones offered are so 2005, so need new phone and service. Wireless service is such a shady and often criminal business, it is hard to find truth in anything online that they all promise. Freedompop has so many red flags even at first glance that it doesn't take a Sherlock Holmes to see that things may/will go very wrong after signing up. First...the first page i looked at offered a deal on a modern Samsung...I clicked on that and an LG phone came up. What?. No Samsung. Then came all the "opt out" options that sneaked in everywhere forcing me to always keep an eagle eye open from that point on for tricks and add-ons.

That was enough for me...........if Freedompop's shadiness and sneakiness at first glace was that easy to spot, only a dope would sign up.

Seems like everyone wants to complain about something cheap, generally speaking you get what you pay for. I bought 2 Samsung S2 phones through Groupon and the first phone worked fine, however the instructions were vague, but for a kids phone I though it was perfect, after all it was free. And I'm pretty technically savvy.

So I bought another one for my other kid and that phone is a bit more flaky, I've had to reset back to manufacture state and the phone sometimes states "please connect to the internet before dialing", kinda screwy but if you update the PRL and profile and the Freedompop apps in the Google Play Store it will work again. I also have a wireless MiFi 4082 I bought through Groupon for Freedompop and it works flawlessly.

AT&T has good customer support and you pay for it! Whenever I've had to reach Freedompop for support it takes days, but it's a free service so my expectations aren't that high. There is an option to get "Premium Support" with one of their packages, that probably would work for those people that need more hand-holding.

Bottom-line, this is a unique company doing something different and I can only hope that in the end the customer wins. Look what T-Mobile has done to Verizon/AT&T.

I also totally agree with the authors comment about being deceptive throughout the registration process, they are hoping the customer isn't paying close attention to "free" and see that it's only free for a month. I almost closed the web page because of that, but I figured the risk was low and worth it, and so far I'm OK with what I got.

Regarding all the people complaining about data being used unknowingly, check your phone, you'll see that it is set to for updates, mail, etc... even when the screen is off. That's not Freedompop's fault, that's a user error, but they could certainly be more helpful in educating people about that.

I was on the free plan, did not use a single MB, and was charged 11.97. I've been trying to get to support, but can't find any to save my life. This is not bad service, this is what you call a scam. When someone advertises something that they're not selling, that's a scam, by definition.

Ordered 3 phones. 1 works wonderfully. 2 didn't work at all and I am still waiting for refunds totaling over $400 for 47 days and counting now. Impossible to get through over the phone, never answered my emails. I actually had to PM on Facebook to get a response. I sure wish this had worked out better, but my son is very happy with his phone that works great and costs us only $2.99 per month.

People are really complaining about 99 cents lol cheapstakes I have Verizon and pay 200 for two lines unlimited everything I would thrilled at 99 cents or even 10 dollars or their unlimited plan for 19.99 a month if I can keep my current phone